Posts in Foreign Film
GUEST COLUMN: Resources for Watching Hindi Movies Online Through Kodi

by Maria Jones

Kodi is a wonderful application through which you can not only view Hollywood movies and TV series but for the Bollywood movies enthusiasts, it is also possible to watch Hindi movies online now through Kodi. New, old, and all-time classic are available here. It is a fact that Bollywood movies have fans all across the globe as these movies feature a wide range of vibrant characters, action, melodic songs, colorful sceneries, and romance at best.

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MOVIE REVIEW: True History of the Kelly Gang

In true western, or in this case, bushranger movie fashion, the edgiest and most intense moments in Justin Kurzel’s True History of the Kelly Gang come in the moments when someone is being held at gunpoint. Drama properly peaks with the potential power released by one little curved metal lever hinging a mechanism of murder and mayhem. The action itself to squeeze that trigger is easy. The decision and ramifications, as we well know, are not.

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EDITORIAL: After "Parasite and "Get Out": What to Expect of Thrillers

Movies are confidently taking up one of the top spots on the list of most common ways of entertainment. The industry itself is bringing in millions every month. It’s a unique form of art that uses a completely different approach to storytelling than books or video games. And just like any art, it has been evolving throughout its entire life span, discovering new genres and developing new techniques.

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GUEST EDITORIAL: The "Parasite" Oscar Win as a Foreign Film is a Game Changer

by Susan Saurel

The Oscar awards 2020 was different as it recorded a streak-breaking award to a South Korean movie which attracts various commentaries in the world scene when Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite took the big hit after 91 years of a streak of English movie wins. At the 92nd Oscars, Parasite took the world by surprise when it was announced for the Best Pictures award, being the first of foreign film announced as the winner of a highly-rated award from the beginning of the Hollywood Film Academy. Also, it is recorded as the first South Korean movie nomination for a competitive award in the international award category.

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OSCAR PREDICTIONS 2020: The race for Best Picture

The short turnaround 92nd Academy Awards arrive host-free for the second consecutive year on Sunday, February 9th, barely a month after nominations were announced. The pace has added excitement and urgency right on down to my website’s 2020 Awards Tracker. Let’s start calling some winners. You have made it until the end. This last chapter column examines the Best Picture race. As I say every year, stick with me and I will win you your Oscar pool!

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OSCAR PREDICTIONS 2020: The minor film categories

The short turnaround 92nd Academy Awards arrive host-free for the second consecutive year on Sunday, February 9th, barely a month after nominations were announced. The pace has added excitement and urgency right on down to my website’s 2020 Awards Tracker. Let’s start calling some winners. This column examines the minor film categories of international, animated, and documentary films. As I say every year, stick with me and I will win you your Oscar pool!

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CAPSULE REVIEWS: The 2020 Academy Award nominees for Best Animated Short

They may not get much attention when they’re not made by Disney and not appearing in front of their animated tentpoles, but the artistry and creativity is alive and well in the field of animated short films.  This year’s five nominees for the 92nd Academy Award are some of the most stark and unique entries I’ve seen in the years I’ve been able to cover the annual best. Below are my capsule reviews of this year’s final five for Best Animated Short.  Naturally, my niche of life lessons are included. Like the documentaries and live-action shorts in other Oscar categories, the animated films are presently collected in a single program to watch on the big screen at Landmark Theatre locations nationwide, including the three venues here in Chicago. 

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MOVIE REVIEW: Parasite

Zoinks, does this movie have vigor!  For those folks who constantly lament that there is nothing original and interesting to watch anymore in this multiplex marketplace of creative bankruptcy, look no further than the minor challenge of following Korean subtitles.  The sly guile simmering behind the decadence of Parasite exceeds any trope one thinks that possible assign to this film.  This is your jaw-dropper. This is your water-cooler winner. This is the one that will keep people talking for a long time.

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GUEST ESSAY: "Cidade de Dues:" A Manipulated Reality of Favelas

By Omar Cardoza

In 2002, Cidade de Deus, otherwise known as City of God, was released in Brazil. It did not take too long before the film became internationally acclaimed, in fact this film was nominated for multiple Oscars although it did not win. The film’s narrative, filming techniques, and setting provide for a compelling argument that the whole story is in fact a true depiction of the favelas Brazil. Films and cinema can be a means to generate discourse between a reality presented to us through the screen and the actual reality of the world. This can cause changes not only to the individual but through enough exposure to a broader audience can cause changes at the societal level and “is extremely important and carries tremendous responsibility since believing that films can shape the collective imagination can (re)affirm or deny a preconception or even reinforce…”

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GUEST ESSAY: The Plague of Exile in "District 9"

By Steven DiGiorgi

After analyzing Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 (2009), the setting of the film capitalizes on the post-colonial setting in Johannesburg, South Africa. What we viewed in the film as a representation of South Africa’s past, through an alternative perspective that identified the oppressed African people as aliens, known as the ‘Prawns’. The isolated community of District 9 represents oppressed living conditions for the millions of people negatively affected during the Apartheid rule (1950-94) (Weaver). For half a century, the South African people had faced dehumanization and discrimination by xenophobic Europeans. The caricature of the European colony was portrayed as the private military, MNU. They followed a typical method of a dystopian society, where power was diverted from the people to the hands of the government.

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GUEST ESSAY: Architecture and Animation with "Howl's Moving Castle"

By Terrance Steenman

To be honest, I never thought too heavily about architecture growing up. I imagine most people feel this way their entire lives. Sure, when we were children there were LEGOs or Lincoln Logs (if you were so fortunate as to have those toys), and with those toys one could build a space of imagination, but rarely do people make the connection that the lessons learned can be applied to the masonry, wood, steel or concrete that shape our daily lives. Constantly in the field of architecture, we are told to think back to a time when we did not have architectural eyes, and to instead view architecture from the lens of the ordinary person

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